Pages

Friday, July 2, 2010

Mental Breakdowns, rich-dude style...

I'm not belittling mental illness, or breakdowns. I'm certainly not saying that they are the preserve of poor people and that the rich, by virtue of their incomes, don't get depressed.

However, there do seem to be a plethora of former rich developers & businesspeople who are citing depressing or mental stress or breakdown as among the reasons they haven't done more to pay back their debt.

I'm sure it's tragic to go from being a multi-millionaire to just an ordinary millionaire.

All the same, I bet a lot of ordinary people who are having difficulty paying the bills are also suffering from stress - but how likely is it that the banks, or anyone else for that matter, will listen to them if they use that as an excuse not to pay? I can't imagine the ESB agreeing not to cut someone off because they're in a delicate mental state.

If these guys are genuinely suffering then fine, leave them alone. But if it's just an excuse, which I suspect it is in at least some cases - it increases the stigma associated with depression and mental illness by making it continue to seem like something that is claimed by people who just don't want to deal with stuff, rather than those who genuinely can't.